Police have made an arrest in a 2011 killing of a mother and her daughter that shocked investigators by its brutality.

Columbia police Chief Skip Holbrook held a news conference Thursday to announce the arrest of Kenneth Canzater, 33, of Paris, California, in the double homicide.

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Candra Alston, 25, and her daughter, Malaysia Boykin, 3, were found dead in their apartment.

"It was one of the most gruesome crime scenes I've witnessed," Columbia police Sgt. Kevin Reese said in 2012.

Holbrook said Canzater was interviewed shortly after the crime because he was a known acquaintance of Alston’s, but until advancements were made in DNA testing, Canzater could not be connected to the crime.

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Kenneth Canzater

Holbrook said that Alston had been shot once in the head and her daughter stabbed multiple times. He said there was no forced entry, which caused investigators to immediately look at people known by Alston.

He said when investigators interviewed Canzater in 2011, he told them he had not been in Alston’s apartment since 2010. Holbrook said the DNA found at the scene was inclusive, and did not prove Canzater had been there.

In reviewing the case in 2013, the State Law Enforcement Division found a palm print that agents entered in a national database. The DNA did not conclusively match Catzaner, but it put him in a group of four people who could not be excluded.

Cold case investigators searched in February for Canzater in a database of violent criminals. He had been arrested in California a short time before for a probation violation on a California robbery charge. Cabzater provided police with a DNA swab. New DNA testing techniques found that the DNA matched to the palm print.

Holbrook said there is no speculation as to a motive, but the crime “seemed characterized by someone who was enraged.”

Catzater was arrested earlier this month outside a motel in Corona, California. He is being held in Riverside, California, and will be extradited to South Carolina to stand trial.

Holbrook acknowledged a joint effort by his department, The Columbia County Sheriff’s Office, the coroner’s office, the U.S. Marshals Service and especially SLED. He said for investigators, the crime was “personal.”

Sharon Williams, a family friend, spoke on behalf of family members. She thanked officers for solving the crime, and said, “This family will sleep tonight.”

"Six years may be too long for us,” she said, “But it’s right on time for God.”